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chases, and are quite nervous at the idea of their donning a silk 

 jacket ; but they have no such feelings as regards a hunt, and when 

 they get up in a red coat for the point-to-point race no objection 

 is made, as it is looked at it in the light of a hunt. 



As we get old we get prosy, and like to talk of ourselves ; so I beg 

 the reader to excuse my egotism in stating that it was I who drew 

 out the first article for a red-coat race which appeared in any 

 programme in Ireland in recent years. It was for our Curraghmore 

 Meeting advertised for February, 1873, but, a severe frost setting 

 in, the meeting had to be postponed to the following May. In the 

 meantime the Ward Hunt adopted our idea, and it was at Fairy- 

 house, in the spring of 1873, that the first was run ; but had it not 

 been for the frost the Curraghmore would have taken the lead, as 

 it most assuredly did in publishing the article. In fact, I proposed 

 the same race to Lord Waterford and the other stewards two years 

 before, but it was not adopted. 



Since then these races have become every year more popular, and 

 they are now the wind-up of the season with several Hunts. 



Ah, me ! many a man in my own old city of Waterford, ay, and 

 for twenty miles around, regrets the loss of his annual outing over 

 old Williamstown, of which he was robbed by those who stopped the 

 Curraghmore Hounds. 



What a jolly little meeting was that of Westmeath in the spring of 

 1890, re-establishing as it did old Newbrook, where the popular Lord 

 Greville and other members of his Hunt dispensed hospitality right 

 and left, and showed a good day's sport to the hunting farmers. The 

 only fault was the artificial course. This could be remedied in future 

 by having the red-coat races run outside the artificial track, taking 

 in the old natural fences. 



Earlier in that season I had the luck to be in the North of Ireland, 

 where I attended such another meeting held near Bangor, co. Down. 

 Sporting Lord Londonderry got it up, and it was restricted to the 

 gentlemen and farmers who hunted with the Down Staghounds and 

 Harriers. He gave a silver cup each for the light-weight and heavy- 

 weights, and cash prizes were given for the farmers' races. There 

 was neither entrance fee nor stakes. Unlike Newbrook the course 

 was perfectly natural, and formed a circle nearer five than four miles, 

 with turns that required a man to use his head, for there were but 

 few flags, while the fences demanded both a good horse and a good 

 man to negotiate them. Nearly twenty started for each of the red- 

 coat races, and while we saw in neither horse nor jockey aspirants to 

 Grand National laurels, every man did his best to win, which we do 

 not always see even in the Grand National. 



Now this Northern sporting event deserves more than passing 

 description. In all parts of Ireland, except Ulster, we have fox- 

 hounds and harriers, not forgetting, of course, the world-renowned 

 Ward Union Staghounds ; therefore it is but natural that through 



